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But even as President Goodluck Jonathan reaffirmed his pledge before a group of international delegates to rescue the missing teens, gruesome details emerged Thursday of the latest atrocity committed by insurgents in the country’s desolate northeast.

Gunmen stormed an open-air market in Gamboru Ngala on Monday, shooting scores of vendors and their families before setting fire to several stalls, burning alive those hiding inside.

The town had been left unguarded and vulnerable after soldiers stationed there were redeployed north in a mission to rescue the kidnapped girls, a senator for the region told the Osun Defender newspaper.

Sen. Ahmed Zanna said more than 300 people were massacred in the remote town, nestled near the Cameroon border. However, presidential spokesman Doyin Okupe said the official death toll as of Thursday evening was about 150.

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Okupe told the Star he would look into the allegations the town was left unprotected but did not respond to repeated followup calls.

A BBC report suggested the militants deliberately lured the security forces out of the town by spreading rumours the abducted girls had been spotted somewhere else.

The militants then arrived in a stampede on motorcycles and armoured cars, shouting “Allahu akbar (God is great)” before opening fire, witnesses say.

When the five-hour raid was over, bodies littered the town.

“We have been collecting bodies from all over the town, on the streets and in burnt homes” resident Musa Abba said. “Nine members of a family were burnt alive in their home.”

Another resident told the BBC that he counted a total of 310 burials in the town’s two graveyards.

“But we are still picking corpses from the main market,” the man said.

As volunteers and rescue workers found further remains in the charred market Thursday, President Jonathan, addressing the World Economic Forum summit in the capital Abuja, thanked foreign countries for their support in trying to rescue the missing girls.

“By your presence here in Nigeria at this time, you have already supported us to win the war against terror. If you had refused to come because of fear, the terrorists would have jubilated and even have committed more havoc,” he told the VIP audience.

“Your coming here to support us morally is a major blow on the terrorists and by God’s grace we will conquer the terrorists,” he said. “I believe that the kidnap of these girls will be the beginning of the end of terror in Nigeria.”

The search is focused on the sprawling Sambisa Forest, an arid bush region roughly the size of Nova Scotia, where the Boko Haram is believed to have taken the girls.

Parents of the missing girls, frustrated by the government’s lack of action, have reportedly ventured into the forest themselves, many armed with just machetes and knives.

The forest makes up just a swath of the vast northeastern state of Borno, the stronghold for Boko Haram militants since they began their insurgency in 2009.

Borno, despite being nicknamed “the Home of Peace,” is the setting of many of the militants’ attacks. Schools, police stations and homes have been torched and destroyed in recent years.

In Maiduguri, Borno’s capital and largest city, the recent violence has left many citizens on edge.

“People are scared, knowing anything can happen,” Steve Amaza, a computer engineering student at the local university, told the Star. “They are aware of the situation and hope it doesn’t come into the city.”

The schoolgirl abductions have sparked protests all over Nigeria and the world. In the southeastern Oyo state, thousands marched in the streets, calling on Jonathan to ensure the immediate release of the children.

Oyo’s governor called the abductions the worst contemporary act of terrorism in Nigeria.

“This act of savagery, barbarism, inhuman and ungodly disposition is an assault on our psyche. It is an assault on our security and a challenge to our safety,” said Abiola Ajimobi, according to a local newspaper, The Punch.

“They have not kidnapped only 234 girls, they have kidnapped our joy of motherhood, they have kidnapped our mothers of tomorrow.”

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